Justice is the real death row issue

Express-News Editorial Board

Published 12:11 am, Wednesday, September 28, 2011

Condemned murderer Lawrence Russell Brewer participated in the Texas death row tradition of requesting a special meal before his execution last week in Huntsville. In the process, he brought an end to the custom.

Brewer was convicted of the racially motivated dragging death of James Byrd Jr. in East Texas 13 years ago, a crime that shocked the state and the nation. Brewer requested two chicken fried steaks, a triple-meat bacon cheeseburger, fried okra, a pound of barbecue, a half loaf of white bread, three fajitas, a meat lover's pizza, a pint of Blue Bell vanilla ice cream, a piece of peanut butter fudge with crushed peanuts and three root beers.

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A prison spokesman said Brewer didn't eat a bite of his last meal. Whether it was the extravagance or the waste that got to him, state Sen. John Whitmire, D-Houston, decided enough is enough.

A former warden of the Walls Unit, where the death chamber is housed, described the practice of granting a special meal to condemned prisoners as a small sign of mercy. But Whitmire, chairman of the Senate Criminal Justice Committee, said it was a privilege to which murderers are not entitled.

“Mr. Byrd didn't get to choose his last meal, the Associated Press quoted Whitmire. “The whole deal is so illogical.”

Whitmire stands accused of political grandstanding and lacking compassion. But his detractors would do better to direct their criticism at the Texas Department of Criminal Justice, which failed to put reasonable limits on the last meal tradition. Death row banquets such as the one served to Brewer represent affronts to victims, their families and taxpayers.

The much bigger issue on Texas' death row has to do with justice, not food. Last year, Anthony Graves became the 12th death row inmate to be exonerated since 1973. Five of those exonerations have come within the last eight years, largely owing to advances in forensic science, especially DNA testing.

There was no question about Brewer's role in Byrd's brutal murder. In jailhouse correspondence, Brewer — a white supremacist — expressed pride in what he had done. But there are many other death penalty cases where guilt is or ought to be subject to reasonable doubt.

Sen. Rodney Ellis, D-Houston, has long championed reforms that would minimize the possibility that innocent people might end up on death row. During the last legislative session, Ellis was successful in passing a measure that makes it easier for convicted individuals to request DNA testing that might prove their innocence.

Ellis also authored a bill that would require law enforcement agencies to develop written eyewitness identification policies based on best practices. That measure, however, failed to get out of committee in the House.

Whitmire and other lawmakers have every right to be outraged about the abuse of the final meal privilege. They should be more outraged that innocent people keep ending up on death row.